


Five Things Alistair Learned While Traveling (Memento Temporis Radio Edit)

by Aris Merquoni (ArisTGD)



Category: Doctor Who (1963)
Genre: Gen, Remix
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-04-15
Updated: 2012-04-15
Packaged: 2017-11-03 17:04:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,562
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/383822
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ArisTGD/pseuds/Aris%20Merquoni
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Doctor Liz Shaw and Brigadier Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart may have been unintentionally separated from Earth until the Doctor could get them home, but the both of them were keeping their eyes peeled for new experiences.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Five Things Alistair Learned While Traveling (Memento Temporis Radio Edit)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Netgirl_y2k](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Netgirl_y2k/gifts).
  * Inspired by [All These Things That We've Done](https://archiveofourown.org/works/66747) by [Netgirl_y2k](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Netgirl_y2k/pseuds/Netgirl_y2k). 



### 1\. Navigation is relative.

Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart dug his toe into the red-brown dirt around the TARDIS' landing site. "Doctor," he said pointedly, "I thought you said we were going back to Earth."

The Doctor squinted up into the sky at the blue dot hanging just above the horizon. "Well, we're only a few million miles away. That's pretty good, for the TARDIS."

Liz Shaw looked up from her examination of the Martian soil and raised a perfectly manicured eyebrow in the Doctor's direction.

The Doctor coughed and raised a hand to his mouth, then pointed toward the horizon. "Oh, look! Ice Warriors!"

"Ice Warriors," Alistair muttered to himself as he walked to stand by Miss Shaw.

She stood and brushed her hands off. "Well, maybe they've got a map the Doctor can borrow. Are you coming?"

### 2\. Infinitely expandable space does not necessarily contain what you want.

"Doctor..." Alistair called down the hallway of the TARDIS.

After a few moments he heard footsteps. "Coming, my dear chap," the Doctor said. He turned a corner and smiled. "Ah, have you found everything satisfactory?"

"I have found _nothing_ satisfactory," Alistair contradicted him. "Don't you have anything at all like a military uniform?"

He was standing in the doorway of the TARDIS' incredibly extensive wardrobe. He'd stripped down to his vest already and was trying to ignore the watermelon-coloured stain on his trousers; his shirt had been a total loss.

The Doctor sniffed, offended. "Why of course I do. There, right behind you."

Alistair turned around and eyed the rack of clothes behind him. "What on Earth are you talking about?"

"Oh, well, not on Earth, my good fellow," the Doctor said, reaching past him and plucking a gaudy, iridescent, draping garment off the rack. "But this is the uniform for the captain of a Irrellian space frigate."

Bringing himself to touch the clothing, Irrellian military or not, was out of the question. "Doctor, I know your ideas of military appropriateness are somewhat skewed, but I am not wearing any uniform with a skirt."

The Doctor smiled unctuously. "Don't let your mind be so limited, Brigadier. Military men throughout your planet's history have fought in garments you would call skirts. Greek hoplites, Scottish Highlanders--"

"Yes, Doctor," Alistair cut him off, "but none of them in a glowing tutu."

For a moment the Doctor just blinked at him, but then he looked down at the garment in question and dragged his finger across his lower lip. "Hmmm. Hmmm. Yes, I think I see what you mean."

Alistair wound up in a white shirt with plain black trousers, but at least nothing sparkled.

### 3\. There's always a chance to learn something new.

"... And then with Professor Swansdon, I started focusing my research on terrestrial impacts from extra-terrestrial objects." Dr. Shaw stifled a yawn and leaned back on Alistair's shoulder. "Excuse me."

Alistair settled himself against the wall of the cell and wrapped his arms around Liz a little more tightly. When the Ice Warriors had thrown them into the freezing hole--apparently Martian soil didn't retain heat very well--the idea of sharing body heat had been obvious but uncomfortable. Now any unease he had of sharing close contact with a woman other than his wife was burned out by the bone-chilling cold and the fact that Liz Shaw was the only other source of heat in the room. "Not at all. Do go on."

"Well, I was studying mineral content and landing patterns," she said. "There was an awful lot of statistics involved."

"The law of large numbers, confidence intervals, that sort of stuff?"

"Yes," Dr. Shaw agreed. Then she twisted slightly to look back at him. "Hey, I didn't know you knew anything about statistics."

"Oh, not a lot," he admitted. "But I was always handy with maths at school; had a good head for trigonometry, though now of course I can never recollect which one's what over the hypotenuse and all that."

Dr. Shaw was silent for a moment. "Can you still use a slide rule?" she asked, her voice gone suddenly alert.

"Well, yes, I think so. What for?"

"Those equations," she said, "in the laboratory on the way here. About the mine shaft. I think I can get them sorted, but--" she chuckled. "Cambridge had an advanced computer calculator installed and I've been using it every chance I can. My slide rule skills have gone all rusty."

"Aha," he said. "Well, as long as you don't need me to understand the whys, Doctor Shaw, my slide rule skills are at your disposal for the whats."

Which was about when the Doctor turned up with the head Ice Warrior scientist to get them out anyway, so neither of them had to negotiate with the guards.

### 4\. Lateral thinking is very important.

Hyroxian Admiral LeDrac appeared to be a very tall man who stooped like an old building after a season of storms. He sat behind his desk and looked straight down at it as Alistair stood on the other side and outlined his--and more importantly, the Doctor's and Liz Shaw's--case.

"Mmmm," the Admiral said when Alistair had finished. "I will send someone to take your plea to the high council." he lifted a hand as though he were moving it through molasses and touched a button on his desk. "Sergeant?"

A younger but not substantially shorter or more lively man stepped in through the door. "Admiral?"

The Admiral made a negligent gesture toward Alistair. "Take a message to the council, tell them that the Brigadier wants to plead for his friends."

"Yes, sir," the sergeant said, and shuffled out again.

Admiral LeDrac sighed voluminously. "Good man, that one," he said. "I'd put him in for officership, but the high council has decreed he can not be promoted."

Alistair frowned. "The high council decrees whether or not you can promote someone?"

"The high council's decrees must always be followed," Admiral LeDrac said.

The dull acceptance made Alistair scoff. "No military on Earth would stand for that," he said. "We answer to a civilian authority, but we manage our own affairs."

The Admiral was silent for a long second, then leaned far back in his seat until he could look at Alistair from under lowered brows. "Go on," he said.

Alistair blinked, then cleared his throat and said, "Well, we manage our own staff, our own promotions, salaries... uniforms..."

"Tell me," Admiral LeDrac said when Alistair had trailed off, "about the uniforms."

After Alistair had awkwardly described the uniforms of UNIT, the Royal Marines, the Scots Guard, and for some reason the Czechoslovakian Air Force, the Admiral closed his eyes for a moment. "Is it possible," he said after a long minute of silence, "to make the uniforms _iridescent_?"

It was all Alistair could do to not roll his eyes. "Well, I believe somewhere there's precedent."

It wasn't until three hours later that he realized that the uniform conversation was the seed that fomented the planet-wide military coup, but it got the Doctor and Liz out of jail, so at that point he didn't want to argue.

### 5\. A change of clothes is essential.

"We need to stabilize the pressure!" the Doctor shouted over the hiss of escaping gas and the screams of stressed metal.

Liz bent over the console the Ice Warriors had rigged up for them, then shouted down the mine shaft, "We need to release the coolant from line six!"

"Line six!" Alistair shouted back up to her, then turned to the bank of pipes and grabbed the wheel. "Just open it, right?"

"Be careful!" Liz shouted as he gave it a twist. "Don't turn it too far or it can--"

He was already giving the wheel a second turn when she shouted, and the keening moan of strained metal gave way to a loud GLORP as a huge blob of watermelon-pink coolant splatted out of the pipe joint. He could only watch as the thick liquid spilled all down the length of his arms, soaking his uniform shirt and splattering over his trousers.

As he stared at liquid dripping from his sleeves, the Doctor poked his head over the side of the hole. "Pressure's leveled off," he said, then frowned. "Goodness, Brigadier. Do be more careful."

By the time he climbed out of the mine shaft and the underground base had been saved, Alistair's entire uniform was a loss. "Well," Liz said when she saw him, "I'm not sure that's your color."

"Very funny," he said. "Doctor, I don't suppose we can make it back to Earth so that I can get a change of clothes?"

"Oh? Well, I'm sure we will, Brigadier," The Doctor said. "And in the meantime, I'm sure there's something suitable in the TARDIS wardrobe. It's dimensionally transcendental, you know. Infinitely expandable."

Liz smirked at the Doctor, then gave Alistair a more reassuring smile. "Come on, it's not that bad," she said. "We'll get back to the TARDIS, get you cleaned up, and I could even be convinced to make you a cup of tea."

Alistair brushed the sticky pink stuff off his hands and reflected that though the planet they had just saved hadn't been Earth, it had actually been a remarkable exercise. "Well, then," he said. "Until we get back to Earth and UNIT HQ, I suppose that will have to do."


End file.
